Cosmic Couture
Review of Richard Quinn Fall 2026 Fashion Show
By Angela Baidoo
Closing out the penultimate day of London Fashion Week Richard Quinn traded his signature set design of opulent grandeur for a starker, space-age interior that felt more lunar base than ballroom. The show-space, echoing the futuristic mood of his past collaboration with Moncler Genius, reframed his couture-level craftsmanship through a sci-fi lens, heightening every sculpted gown and corseted silhouette.
By juxtaposing high society dress codes with the clean minimalism of a space station, Quinn could be proposing the solution to the question of what wear to a gala in the year 3026? Not in utilitarian space suits but his recharged vision of occasionwear that merges kink, classicism, and cosmic couture.
THE COLLECTION
THE VIBE
Couture in Contrast, Future Archive
Projection can often be perceived as something negative, but next season Richard Quinn looks set to beam us into the not-so-distant future.
Reminiscent of the set design for his collaboration with Moncler Genius Collection 8 in 2020, a space-age interior replaced the designers usual grandeur. This dramatic change in show-space direction had the effect of heightening the way his expertly crafted gowns were perceived. While reintroducing a hint of the kink that defined the designer when he first burst onto the scene in 2018.
The presentation was a juxtaposing of two very separate visual identities. The first an emblem of high society and the world of black-tie gatherings that require strict dress codes. The second a space station-style all-white hub more akin to life on Mars. Posing the question of what women, of a certain social stature might wear in the year 3026. When humankind has transferred its existence to the outer edges of our solar system.
Space-age fashion, from Paco Rabanne and André Courrèges metallic mini dresses of the 1960s to Balenciaga’s space-bot armour from spring 2007, have tended to lean towards the overly technical. Logical, as survival would suggest the necessity of clothing that functionally performs against the extreme atmosphere of space. But after an initial settling-in period, it appears Quinn is proposing that his well-heeled customer will need more than a nylon jumpsuit to traverse a brave new world.
The designers vision of the future is firmly rooted in classicism. Finding a sense of harmony in his modern-day occasionwear edit, his modernised iterations of 1950s silhouettes were woven through with the bombast of the 1980s (the velvet and hot pink puffball mini deserves a red-carpet debut at the upcoming Academy Awards) that will endure as part of his ‘future archive.’
THE WRAP UP
The space-age lineage of designers such as Paco Rabanne and André Courrèges may have inspired today’s set design, but Quinn chose to anchor the future of his collection firmly in the past. His reworked fifties silhouettes, were coupled with a power-dressing exuberance, suggesting that even on the outer edges of the solar system, or wherever humanity lands next, there will always be room for a show-stopping gown.
